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ydpl8s
Trad climber
Santa Monica, California
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Apr 16, 2013 - 12:49pm PT
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I used to put on my "hoffers" for friction climbs cuz their rubber was stickier than my Robbins or Chouinards.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 16, 2013 - 01:18pm PT
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I'd say in this country,
Trad starts more or less in the Golden Age with the free climbing efforts of Robbins, Pratt, Kamps, Sacherer, Powell, Beck, Higgins, Ament, Gill, Dalke, Erickson, Briggs, Stannard, Goldstone et al.,
But, it really got rolling and better defined with the clean climbing revolution as espoused by Robbins, Chouinard, Stannard, and others,
Then daylighted by this seminal piece:
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ydpl8s
Trad climber
Santa Monica, California
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Apr 16, 2013 - 01:27pm PT
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Galen, so much talent in so many arenas, and cover boy looks, he never ceased to amaze me .... now that guy's TRAD! RIP
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 16, 2013 - 01:29pm PT
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Thanks Dingus,
For your imaginative counterpoint and modern perspectives throughout this discussion!
Would that we all had been blessed with your connective tissue, no doubt we'd be tearing it up on the sport circuit right there with you!
Most all of my friends who still have a good deal of flesh in the game do just that.
Nevertheless, long live TRAD™ ♥
Bon Voyage Mon Ami!
Roy
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patrick compton
Trad climber
van
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Apr 16, 2013 - 01:31pm PT
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Trad starts more or less in the Golden Age with the free climbing efforts of Robbins, Pratt, Kamps, Sacherer, Powell, Beck, Ament, Stannard, et al.,
Why isn't now the golden age of Trad? Tread title: What IS Trad.
Everything is being done cleaner, faster, harder.... better? I would say yes.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 16, 2013 - 01:40pm PT
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Kevin,
Agreed: aid climbing ain't Trad.
That cover is posted to speak more to the clean climbing portion of our development which bled into trad and defined a great deal of the so-called environmental aspects of it, which we haven't broached yet. Which in short, isn't environmental in the global sense, but environmental in the way in which the rock is either altered or not altered in terms of keeping the climber's encounter with nature relatively fresh and unfettered by artifice.
We should talk about this and I'd like to say some stuff after I get it spun up a bit. Note that I've already made the distinction that this isn't meant to be some sort of comparative or exclusionary effort in considering trad versus sport or any such thing, when speaking of any environmental aspects. Thanks!
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 16, 2013 - 01:45pm PT
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Patrick asked/suggested:
Why isn't now the golden age of Trad? Tread title: What IS Trad.
Good question Patrick; please note I didn't say that was The Golden Age of Trad, I said, or suggested rather, although I know it looks more like a proclamation, that trad starts in The Golden Age.
I would submit that the Golden Age of Trad, in Yosemite specifically, starts with Peter Haan, Barry Bates, Mark Klemens, et al. ... and really flowers with The Stonemasters, speaking of the West Coast. Moving east you meet Erickson, Briggs, Breashears, et al. in Colorado, then Stannard, Goldstone et al., in the Gunks, just to name a few.
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McHale's Navy
Trad climber
Panorama City, California & living in Seattle
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Apr 16, 2013 - 01:49pm PT
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That's Dennis on the cover there isn't it?
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Apr 16, 2013 - 01:58pm PT
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That's Dennis on the cover there isn't it?
Yes it is. I was in the Valley, intending to head up the RNWF in the more, um, "traditional" manner (i.e. with hammers, pitons and nuts) when we saw Galen, Dennis and Doug heading out in the same direction in more virtuous form. We decided to go elsewhere.
John
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 16, 2013 - 02:02pm PT
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That's Dennis on the cover there isn't it? It's a different Dennis: not Dennis Horning but Dennis Hennek! (And you knew that)
I don't have a quick hand at Photoshop, but darn it if I did ...
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McHale's Navy
Trad climber
Panorama City, California & living in Seattle
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Apr 16, 2013 - 02:04pm PT
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That's funny. I had a vision of making one of those piton wind-chimes yesterday.
Who's Dennis Horning? Haha!
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 16, 2013 - 02:08pm PT
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Then Patrick Compton suggested:
Everything is being done cleaner, faster, harder.... better? I would say yes. Whatever it's called it's quite something that's for darn sure! The thing is, as far as Yosemite goes, there's been such continuous campaigning there to push the limits that it's hard to set any kind of demarcation after the Stonemasters. Again I believe, that Peter Haan, Barry Bates, and Mark Clemens, et al. along with the Stonemasters and all the Colorado and East Coast guys who I threw up above the National Geographic cover, constitutes the Golden age of trad. To my mind anyhow.
(Not to leave Todd Skinner/Paul Piana out of it on purpose or anything ... They were active in a kind of nether territory, in terms of eras and certainly tactics)
Perhaps however, we could look at the Huber's efforts on El Capitan, followed by Tommy Caldwell, as the beginning of a BIG Renaissance. I think Dean Potter, then Alex Honnold, due to his very strong focus on free solo is really the epicenter of something like a TRAD BIG BANG.
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Jaybro
Social climber
Wolf City, Wyoming
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Apr 16, 2013 - 02:20pm PT
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TodayItalic Text Is the golden Age of Trad!
Fortunately most of the conformist herd is distracted by sportclimbing!
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 16, 2013 - 02:34pm PT
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Warbler submitted:
Shouldn't the bar be set high for the coveted trad status? Not following you Kevin, you mean higher than the groups which I circumscribed above as comprising the primary actors in the Golden Age Of Trad?
Or do you mean from the Hubers forward? And that tactics have changed with them?
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 16, 2013 - 02:39pm PT
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Ed Hartouni pondered:
Caldwell et al. freeing those long aid routes put up in the Stonemaster era... Iad ass, but Trad? I don't know... I think this is what Kevin is getting at: addressing the near sea change in tactics. Dingus and I mulled this over way way back upthread. Not sure if you are reading every post.
Yes, there's question, question enough that it might be called postmodern trad. But The Golden Age, no. I believe that was in the 70s.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 16, 2013 - 02:54pm PT
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This is what Patrick Compton and Dingus have been getting at all along:
The laudable distinction that, playing by the old rules, trad probably doesn't really have a home going forward in terms of cutting edge evolution and that it has not since say, Skinner and Piana, Lynn Hill freeing The Nose, Hubers and etc..
Unless we allow that the rules have been acceptably flexed/evolved for these generations just as Bachar flexed them at the beginning of the 80s to include drilling off of hooks. As we've said, all these people came in from the top so it's a pretty big flex.
Taking all this into consideration, and sticking with the rules which Higgins circumscribed it (plus Bachar's hooks), Trad really only exists for those of us who still bang around in this style in a recreational capacity. Plus Honnold.
The only example extant which I can think of in the modern era, is Leo Houlding's efforts on the right side of El Capitan going ground-up, maybe the European guy who did something over by what was it, Yosemite Falls? ... going ground-up. Also of course, Scott Cosgrove and Kurt Smith on the Free Muir, now sometime ago.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 16, 2013 - 02:57pm PT
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Didn't some European guy recently free something rated 5.13 in the Black Canyon from the ground up in one push? That's Trad.
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Apr 16, 2013 - 03:03pm PT
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You're right, Tarbuster, because it's hard to say what is or isn't trad. It's ironic that Cosgrove and Smith got busted for power drilling on the attempt to free the Muir because, in retrospect, many of us view that attempt as one in the tradition of trad, not sport, climbing. Or maybe, to use a term suggested upthread, "traid" climbing.
I interpreted Kevin's statement to mean that we set "trad" as placing the most voluntary restraints. If so, I have trouble with that too, because I want to consider myself a trad climber, but I can't match Honnold's feats. Besides, my now almost 30-year-old oral prenuptial agreement is that I won't do technical free soloing.
Nonetheless, Honnold on Half Dome strikes me as one within the trad umbrella because it relies on intelligent risk management. OK, intelligent for him, not me! I just hope trad still encompasses leading with pro placed on the lead.
John
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 16, 2013 - 03:11pm PT
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Nonetheless, Honnold on Half Dome strikes me as one within the trad umbrella
As long as we're not just sticking to this idea that trad only circumscribes first ascent behavior. It's totally trad. It's a TRAD BIG BANG.
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